Steady Personality Traits Correlate to Steady Driving Low Turnover

If a company has a low employee turnover rate, it is good for business.
It isn’t luck that keeps drivers from leaving Highway Transport Chemical, it is good planning.
At our most recent operations meeting, Highway Transport Chemical reported a turnover rate of 21%...a figure considerably below the industry average.

Overall tank industry driver turnover has reached levels as high as 120%.

Personality traits of drivers can predict turnover and safety performance, according to preliminary results of a study by researchers at the University of Notre Dame.
The study by professors Timothy Judge and Mike Crant evaluated a group of 450 drivers from seven different motor carriers over a two-year period and found that four personality traits strongly correlate with turnover and safety.
Orderliness is one predictor of driver turnover, for example, and anger is one for driver safety, the study found.

“Driver with an orderly trait are structured. They take notes, make lists, and keep their paperwork in order,” said Tim Hindes, CEO of Stay Metrics, a company based in South Bend, Indiana that helps companies with driver retention issues whose clients provided data for the study.
Hindes said he plans to develop a selection tool for carriers to screen job applicants and will begin field testing a predictive model with four carriers whose driver will take a personality test during orientation. Turnover and safety performance will then be monitored for the next six months. Hindes said he will use that data to develop a new selection tool that hopefully will be available in July 2016.